Unheralded Scientist Behind Nobel for DNA

Published: April 11, 1993

In reading "Watson Relinquishes Major Role at Lab" [ March 21 ] , I realized that, once again, a grave injustice has been done to Rosalind Franklin. Her name was omitted from this article, as it has been for years by textbooks, nonfictional publications, Watson and Crick's scientific manuscripts and, ironically enough, "The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA" by James Watson.

Rosalind Franklin was a dedicated scientist working at the King's College laboratory in London in the 1950's, along with Maurice Wilkins, recipient of the 1962 Nobel Prize for medicine and physiology. While there she experimented with X-ray crystallography techniques on deoxyribonucleic acid and used these patterns to decipher the structure of DNA. As James Watson and Francis Crick were struggling with the idea of a triple helical structure, Rosalind Franklin found that DNA was a double helix with the sugar-phosphate backbone on the outside, contradicting Watson and Crick's ideas. In February 1953, Watson came to Franklin's laboratory and asked Maurice Wilkins if he could see the X-ray film patterns. Without asking her permission, Wilkins agreed to show him, and it was this secret information that aided Watson and Crick in their discovery of DNA's structure. To the day of her death, Rosalind never knew that her patterns were revealed to Watson and that this was the reason they won the "competition" for DNA's discovery. This information appears in "Rosalind Franklin and DNA" by Anne Sayre, published in 1975.

As a female high school student, I feel that increased awareness of the unpublicized accomplishments of women scientists will inspire a new generation. Perhaps it is time for Rosalind Franklin to receive recognition for her years of work and discoveries. NADIA SAWICKI Holliswood The writer is a student at Hunter College High School.